Gone
by BrenRenQoI
Summary: Point of View episode tag AlterSam is in mourning...
1. Chapter 1

Gone

by Bren Ren

Summary: Dealing with grief

Episode: Post Point-of-View, Alter-Sam's PoV

Category: Angst

Rating: All Audiences

* * *

He's gone.

I can still smell him. A slight lingering scent of aftershave, the blood and fear of battle, the sweet smell of relief… all mixed with something that could only be described as the essence of Jack O'Neill.

Her husband. Gone. Never returning to her. The Asgard could only save those who had been dead less than twenty-four hours. Jack had been gone… too long.

She had to find the strength to go on alone. There was an entire planet to rebuild after the Goa'uld invasion, and she knew she would be needed more than ever. Somehow, though, it didn't matter. None of it mattered. She absently supposed shock must be finally setting in.

Her quarters inside the main base for the SGA remained miraculously intact, a fact for which she was immensely grateful. She knew she couldn't go back home yet and face the memories there. At least her quarters were all hers; her own private retreat from everyone and everything, even Jack, when he came bugging her about some gismo or gadget he'd pilfered from her lab not working after he "fixed it".

The thought brought out a small chuckle, but it quickly dissolved into bitter, desperate tears. She thought she'd wept her soul out already, and yet this fresh deluge seemed as strong as any before. She couldn't stop it, couldn't hold it back at all. Great heaving sobs wracked her body for what seemed an eternity. She thought she might very well never stop crying.

At that darkest moment, that moment when you know you will either break completely and permanently, or find that elusive strength to pick up the pieces of what's left of your life and go on, when she cried out for him. She was met with only silence.

Then, she felt something… a touch, on her shoulder. She rolled around on the tiny bunk, but she was still alone. Then she caught a whiff of… something…. Something that was unmistakably Jack O'Neill.

"Jack?" she whispered.

Still only silence. The tears continued to stream down her flushed and swollen cheeks, now softer, quieter sobs burbling past her lips. She pulled out their wedding photo once more. She had kept this shot in her lab until the attack. Some unknown instinct prompted her to take it with her when she and Kowalski decided to use the quantum mirror with or without Hammond's blessing.

As she held it gingerly between two fingertips, her other hand gently traced the outline of the happy, laughing image of her husband. A fresh set of tears threatened to come tearing out of her once more, and she set the picture down on the nightstand, much like she had in that alternate universe, grabbed herself a pillow, and curled up for another sleepless, tearful night.

As she had every night since the Asgard left, she dreamt only of Jack; Jack somehow miraculously returning to her. And every morning, she awoke to the cold reality of a lonely, empty bed. And the whole day would begin again. Rebuild, reinforce defenses, pretend not to be devastated that her husband was… gone.

She would never accept his death.

Fini

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	2. Chapter 2

She touched the mirror, it's features smooth, black, and cold. She wondered. She thought hard. She remembered. She touched it once more.

Then, she took hold of it, firmly in her grasp the symbol turned freely. The mirror came to life before her eyes. She saw her own image reflected in the mirror, and she reached out to touch it. The figure in the mirror echoed her action, and for a moment the hands hung in the air, not quite touching, not pulling away, just pointing towards one another. She dropped her hand and fiddled with the controls in her other hand. The image blinked out, into another time and place.

It reflected a place filled with death and darkness, as were the next several images to shimmer through the mirror. Then it shifted into unfamiliar territory, a place clean and empty. Maybe the right one, finally. She lifted her hand to touch the mirror once again, and in the blink of an eye, she was gone from the room.

She was still inside the base, of that she was certain. What lay beyond the doors of the storage room she found herself in remained to be seen. She slowly walked away from the mirror, pocketing the control as she reached the door. She opened it and walked out of the room.

The corridor was empty. She had a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach at what that might mean. She began walking down the hall, the soft thud of her boots echoing loudly as she strode with purpose. She made her way to the lift and descended to the level of the General's office. If there was anyone there with the answers to her questions, he would be there.

She reached the office without encountering another soul, living or otherwise, and she was mildly surprised at how clean but empty everything was. She closed her eyes and sucked in every last drop of oxygen her lungs could hold, exhaling very slowly as she opened the door…

There in the large leather seat was General George Hammond, his head buried nose deep in paperwork. He looked up at the sound of the door shutting and his eyes widened in great surprise at the sight of her.

"Samantha?" he asked, incredulous.

She smiled. "Hello, sir."

"How can this be? You're dead!"

"I came through the quantum mirror…Dead?" She swallowed hard. She hadn't expected to find herself dead.

"Yes, when the Goa'uld attacked a few months ago."

She winced, the memory of her own survival against the Goa'uld too fresh in her mind. "I'm only here for one reason, sir," she began. She paused, hesitating for a moment. Thoughts raced through her head. Was she really here doing this? Using such advanced technology for purely personal gain? It was so unlike her to even consider such an action, and yet, here she was. "Is Jack O'Neill here?"

The General frowned. "Yes, but—"

"I need to see him. Please."

"Just who are you to come in here demanding to see Colonel O'Neill?"

She faltered for a moment before continuing. "I'm… his wife."

He blinked twice before responding. "I beg your pardon?"

"In my…reality, I'm his wife." She paused, again unsure of her own motivation in coming here. She couldn't just replace her Jack with another, and yet… here she was, seeking him out. "We were married a year ago. I'm not in the military…"

"I see… I think. Why don't you sit down… I'll call Jack in." At that, he reached over and picked up his grey phone. He pushed a couple of buttons. "Colonel O'Neill, I need you in my office right away," he said into the phone. "Thank you, Colonel." He hung up the phone and turned his attention back to the young woman sitting in front of him.

Her hair was quite a bit longer than he was accustomed to seeing round Carter's face. She also looked a tad… more fierce than he remembered. "Were you also attacked by the Goa'uld?"

"Yes, sir. We would have been completely annihilated had it not been for the quantum mirror. Charles Kowalski and I were able to retrieve help and establish an alliance with the Asgard thanks to the people we found on the other side. But we lost a lot of good people before the Asgard were able to come to our rescue. Including…"

Before she could finish, the subject entered the room in the form of one Jack O'Neill. She sucked in a lungful of air; he always did take her breath away. "Jack," she said softly.

Jack paled. He visibly, physically paled at the sight of her. He turned to the General. "Is this some sort of sick cosmic joke?"

"No, Jack… this is Samantha Carter. She came through the quantum mirror."

He blinked hard at the General, then swallowed hard before turning to look at her again.

Her hair was long, that was different. But her eyes… they were still the bluest blue he'd ever seen, and still full of too many emotions for Jack to full digest, but it was, without a doubt, the woman he thought he'd never see again. The woman he never dared love out loud, but loved nonetheless was standing right before him.

But it wasn't quite her. He knew that, but it didn't stop his heart from racing.

"Carter?" He whispered.

"Actually," she said with a small smile, "it's O'Neill."


	3. Chapter 3

* * *

She turned her attention back to General Hammond. "Could we have a moment… alone, please, sir?

General Hammond spared a glance at O'Neill, who nodded slightly, then looked back to the hauntingly familiar young woman. "Very well, I have some inspections to do…" He picked up a stack of paperwork and left the office.

They were alone now, and her mind was racing, on overload, there were too many things she needed to say, she didn't know where to start.

Jack then saved her the decision by speaking. "O'Neill? Really?"

She smiled and nodded. "Almost two years ago." She swallowed hard before continuing. "But he died about a year ago, when the Goa'uld attacked and nearly wiped out the entire planet. I survived through the quantum mirror. It took me and Charles Kowalski to a parallel SGA… they called it the Stargate Command, the SGC… Anyway, they introduced us to the Asgard and the little grey guys chased off the Goa'uld in a matter of moments. We were left with a hell of a mess to rebuild, and a year later we've barely put a dent in it…" She faltered, unsure of how to continue.

"So why are you here? If you're looking for help with the clean-up, you've come to the wrong universe. We're in it just as deep. The Goa'uld were here for quite a while before we got lucky in reaching the Asgard ourselves." Jack looked at her with guarded eyes. She knew him well, though, and she understood his suspicion.

"I came here to find you, Jack…" She paused, mentally willing him to understand her as well as she understood him. "What was it like? Your relationship with… with your Samantha Carter?"

Jack closed his eyes in a brief wince before he answered. "We were, ah… engaged. Never quite made it to the altar… It was supposed to be… a month after the Goa'uld attack, and she didn't make it…" He stopped, swallowed hard, and looked at Sam with scrutinizing eyes.

"We were celebrating our first anniversary when the Goa'uld attacked us," she said quietly. "He died early in the battle…and a part of me died with him. It's been a year now and I still can't seem to make it through a single day without crying my heart out. It is hell living without you, and I can't keep doing it. Then I realized… maybe I don't have to… I have access to this amazing piece of technology, with the clearance to do anything I want with it… and maybe it's crazy, but I thought, maybe… just maybe, there's a Jack O'Neill out there who lost his Samantha Carter and was just as desperate as I was to have her back in his life."

Jack stared at her for a long quiet moment. "You are not my Sam."

"And you are not my Jack… but we could be," she responded, her eyes full of hope.

"You can't just replace someone like that… It's wrong… some how," he said with a frown.

"I can't live without Jack O'Neill. It is wrong in every way. We're supposed to be together, and if it means bending the rules of reality, so be it. I need you in my life. Every moment, every accomplishment, even the setbacks, they mean nothing when I can't share them with you." She paused and sighed. "I can't let you go. It's as simple as that."

"And I supposed to just drop everything, friends, job, life, you name it, and take a trip through the looking glass with you?" His frown deepened. "Why would I do that?

"Because you love Samantha Carter as much as I love Jack O'Neill. Because everything in your life rings as hollow and empty as mine without your other half." She leaned in close to him. "Because right now, you can't imagine another minute without me in it."

She was too close; he was breathing her scent in with every breath and it was driving him to the brink of something. She even smelled like his Sam. She was close, so close… too close for comfort. He shifted back away from her, sucking in a lungful of air as he moved.

"Am I wrong?" she asked gently.

He looked at her for another long moment, his hot gaze boring into hers. "No… you're not wrong… You're absolutely right, living without Samantha Carter is pure hell." The lines in his brow deepened again as he spoke. "But you aren't the Samantha Carter I know and—" He broke off, not ready to speak of such emotions with her; she wasn't his Sam, he kept telling himself.

"No, I'm not. And you're not my Jack, we've already established that. There's no bringing them back, though. All we can do is move on… and we have the opportunity to do that together. You're as close to my Jack as I can get… and I am desperate to have you in my life again." Tears began to well up in her eyes, but she blinked them away. "I know that my Jack would want me to be happy, no matter what. And I know, deep down, I can only be truly happy with Jack O'Neill. That man is my soul mate, my other half, the one thing I can't live without..." She finally reached her breaking point, unable to keep the tears at bay any longer. They began streaming down her face unheeded.

"This is crazy," Jack muttered. "But which is crazier, hopping realities, or the fact that I'm actually considering it?"

Her eyes couldn't be any more full of hope than they were at that moment. Her tongue darted out to moisten her suddenly too dry lips before she spoke. "I consulted with the Asgard before I came out on this crazy mission… and they can prevent you ever suffering from the quantum tremors. It would be completely safe for you to stay… for as long as you wanted…and if you wanted, you could even come back and visit—"

"Not much of anyone I'd want to visit, to be honest. Daniel's dead, Teal'c went back to Chulak when the Goa'uld attack and no one has heard from him since… and since I have no family left living… that doesn't leave me with much to tie me here…" Jack shook his head, unable to believe what was about to come out of his own mouth. "What the hell? I've got nothing to lose…"

Sam smiled, that beautiful million watt beam that he missed so terribly. Maybe, just maybe this could work. She wasn't his Sam… but she could be.

She reached a hand out to touch his face. "And a whole new lifetime with me to gain." He wasn't her Jack, but he felt just like him. He was close, so close… It would work, it had to. The alternative, living without any version of him, was too much pain for her to bear any longer; it drove her to this desperate measure. He wasn't her Jack yet, but he would be, eventually. She finally leaned in and closed the last bit of space between them, pressing her lips to his in a kiss as soft as a gently summer rain.

When she pulled away, she looked at him quizzically, unsure of his reaction. After a moment, he smiled ever so slightly. "Not the same… but not bad."

"It will never be the same," she replied. "But it can still be good. We were good together… and we will be again." She grinned, then, a bright tooth baring, eye sparkling smile that his Sam had saved just for him; he realized, suddenly, that she was almost his Sam already, and after only a few minutes together; a lifetime would be plenty of time to fall in love with her all over again. She watched the dawning realization cross through his features, and before he could say a word, she pulled him close, capturing him in another sweet, timeless kiss.


End file.
